Tuesday, May 31, 2011

I did a post once about not forcing things into your decor. You know what I mean. You're at Marshalls/Ross/Home Goods/Fill in the Blank and you find something that you absolutely must have. It comes home with you and then you wander aimlessly from room to room trying to find it the perfect home. I have a name for those things - I call them Forget-Me-Nots. My Forget-Me-Nots usually bounce from shelf to shelf, wall to wall, or table to table before being cast onto the Island of Misfit Decor. Then when Tweakday rolls around (that's the day after hump day), and I need too fill a vacant spot, I go to the Island and bring out a Forget-Me-Not.

I have one FMN that's been trying for months to make it off the island. At a church rummage sale last year I spotted this Southern Living at home cake stand and my heart palpitated as I scored it for $4. I had always wanted one.

Well, you guessed it, I brought it home and did the walk of shame around my house.
I feel so defeated when this happens - especially with a score like this one. It's just not fair!

I decided I wasn't going to give up this time. I would find a home for my SLAH FMN if it killed me. And find a home for it is just what I did.

Monday, May 30, 2011

It's time to announce the winner of my Cottage Charm Giveaway! Thanks to everyone who entered and followed along. I hope you continue to follow me and enjoy the ride!
The winner of the bunny footstool, offered from my Etsy store Larkspur Interiors, was selected by Random.Org. I compiled a list, using the same name consecutively if you added my giveaway to your sidebar, tweeted or mentioned on FB, so the names didn't necessarily match up to the number you were on the comment list (does that make sense?). The winning number was 46.

Friday, May 27, 2011

There's still two more days to enter my Cottage Charm Giveaway. Just click on the link on my sidebar to enter!
In the meantime, I thought I'd give you a sneak peak at my latest project!

Also want to apologize for not visiting/commenting/responding in the past few days. My server has not been allowing me to access my blog. I'm on a different server now and it seems to be working. I just hate it when I can't respond to each of you, so please forgive me!

I will try to get around and visit you all this weekend. Hope you all enjoy your day!
xoxo,
Kim

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Just a reminder that my Cottage Charm Giveaway ends Sunday, May 29th at 9 p.m., Eastern Time. Just click on the link on my sidebar to enter!!!

One of my favorite pieces in my home is this antique china cabinet I got last year at a barn sale.

I literally pulled it out of some guy's barn.
And with hubby's help, I transformed her into this.

You can read about the complete transformation here, including how I added toile fabric to the back of the inside.
I got the idea to add a harlequin design after seeing lots of great furniture transformations in blogland.

Thanks to Tracy at Tracy's Trinkets and Treasures for giving me the 411 on how to go about stenciling.
I purchased a harlequin stencil online at Tracy's suggestion and I'm so glad I did, because my attempts at creating my own stencil were a complete failure!

I first mixed a combination of acrylic paints to get a lighter sage on the panels first. Then went over the stencil with just the sage for a tone-on-tone look.

I then went over the panels with a dark walnut stain and quickly wiped off the excess. The last step was a clear wax to lighten the dark stain.

For the bottom I just used the straight sage paint and stained then sanded a good portion of it to lighten it up and give it a worn look, followed by the clear wax.

I think she looks special now and I'm so happy with the change!

The stencil was purchased on Ebay from Stencils By Joanie. I thought the prices were very reasonable.

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

This past weekend was full of surprises of all different kinds. I came home from yardsaling to find a huge snake in my back yard! Thank goodness my dad is an expert at wildlife and was able to put him back into the woods for us.

No sirree this was not your average garden snake!

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Thanks Dad for coming to the rescue!!

I also scored big on the yardsale circuit Sat. with some great finds, both for me and my Etsy store!
The first find of the day was this game table. Denise talked the seller down from $20 to $15. It's got great detail.

Beautiful leather top.

This sweet vintage magazine holder is going to be for sale on my Etsy store.

Isn't she pretty?

This is my favorite find of the day! A bamboo plant stand for only $4!!! Can you "stand" it???

LOVE her!!! For now I'm going to put her in storage until our back patio gets a new roof.

Also have some exciting news to share with my bloggy friends. Denise and I have been thinking about having a booth at a local market and were just looking for a sign that the time was right. Well, thanks to Laura at Finding Home, we got our sign.

My hubby and I have been teaching 3rd Grade Sunday School in the same room of our church for years, yet I didn't notice this sign until last week.

It struck a chord with me because Turtles have special meaning to me. I had a rough childhood and my Dad, who is also a middle child, always called me his turtle. We had our own mantra - "The turtle always wins the race" he would tell me. Dad started giving me turtles he brought home from his travels with my Mom and I now have a collection. The saying on the sign was a reference to turtles I had never heard before and I loved it!

Imagine my shock when I was blogging that same night and came across Laura's post about her first home show. At the end of her post, Laura mentioned this exact same saying about turtles. In fact, her post was called "Turtle Signs"! I had just told Denise that same weekend that we need to start praying that God would give us a sign if the time was right for us to have a show. Well, if this isn't a sign from God I don't know what is! So thanks again to Laura and of course to my Lord for His greatness.

Denise and I are so excited to get started. Our first show will hopefully be in Sept. giving us the whole Summer to prepare. We've already started accumulating lots of vintage goodness to sell and hubby helped us make our first corkboard, which will be for sale too.

This thing is huge and has lots of gorgeous detail. I'm thinking about aging the frame a bit, but not sure yet.

That's all for now! Thanks for stopping by. Today I'm also guest-posting for Traci at Beneath My Heart for her "Help, I'm Moving" series. Stop by Traci's blog to see my post about Craig's List!

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Finding bliss in everyday life and getting by with a little help from my friends: my college sweetheart-turned-husband and our 3 blissful kids - two teenage girls and one miracle baby boy. I'm fascinated by any inanimate object with a past. Imagining where things came from and who they belonged to is my passion. Finding a new home for them is my challenge.